You actually believe that the American middle class is faltering is because it is excessively taxed? You know, there's no helping the American middle class. You're all John Galt in your own mind.

Thank you for the colorful metaphor, but no, I don't. Some years back when I left Canada, in my particular neck of the woods, an OK job would gross you 60K and net you approximately half of that. My first job at a gas station, I made like $900 a month and paid almost nothing in taxes. Add on top of that a 10% sales tax and 7% gst on most purchases and yeah, taxes were definitely a major contributing factor in the decline of the middle class. I'm sure they're also a factor in the US, though how much of one I'm not sure.

Fox wrote:

If you've never had much time for children, it's because you've never made much time for children. After all, if your claim that someone can "pop out a bunch of kids" and live comfortably is true, nothing stops you from doing the same if children were important to you. But we both know it's not that easy: having children without stable employment can very easily consign a person to poverty, even with some degree of social support, and that's no doubt a part of what has caused you hesitate to commit to it.

I agree entirely. I could have knocked up some girl at 15 and lived comfortably in a duplex for the rest of my life on social security. The problem I have is that the system seems to be actively encouraging this type of behavior and at the same time passively condemning it. Oh, you shouldn't do that, but if you do, we'll totally give you money for the rest of your life that we glean from those who tried harder than you.

Fox wrote:

Society is totally within its rights -- and behaving totally rationally -- to reallocate assets away from loners like yourself and towards child-bearing couples. Society needs people, and moreover, it needs unintelligent people just as much -- if not more -- than it needs intelligent ones, because it's unintelligent people that do the bulk of the actual hard work. Crops are rotting unpicked in some places in the United States, and it's not for lack of physics professors and lawyers. Whatever cushy middle-class job you envision yourself in, it's going to require a lot of lower-class people working beneath you to necessitate it.

I agree with this too, yet I can't help but feel there must be a better solution than ridiculous taxes and exorbitant social systems particularly prevalent in my neck of the woods. Maybe raise minimum wage and make some of those lower class jobs less dead-end. Judging from the kind of lives the people who owned that gas station I was working at years ago lived, they could have been paying me twice what I made and hardly suffering themselves.

Would you please give my hypothetical wife a better hypothetical position. I will never marry a lawyer.

You can have any upwardly-mobile, career-oriented feminist you like, Leon. H.R. representative? Suffering-studies professor? Something in advertising?

Leon wrote:

Also, as someone who works, and does all the housework, as I currently live alone, you must be doing it wrong if you really believe its such an imposing burden that one spouse needs to do it full time.

I might have fallen for this one before getting married and having children, but I have learned that the amount of housework a single man requires to keep his affairs in order is trivial compared to that of an entire family. The two are simply not comparable, especially while the children are still young.

You actually believe that the American middle class is faltering is because it is excessively taxed? You know, there's no helping the American middle class. You're all John Galt in your own mind.

Thank you for the colorful metaphor, but no, I don't. Some years back when I left Canada ...

Alright, in all fairness, I forgot you were Canadian, and responded to you thinking you were from America.

Underwaterbob wrote:

I agree with this too, yet I can't help but feel there must be a better solution than ridiculous taxes and exorbitant social systems particularly prevalent in my neck of the woods. Maybe raise minimum wage and make some of those lower class jobs less dead-end. Judging from the kind of lives the people who owned that gas station I was working at years ago lived, they could have been paying me twice what I made and hardly suffering themselves.

Minimum wage only takes you so far, because it predicates itself upon people being hired in the first place. I will say, though, that I think almost anyone, at heart, would rather earn their keep than have it handed to them.

Seriously, is there any proof that a stay at home mom is better for children?

No, there isn't.

Quote:

In fact, girls seem to gain from being in a household where their mother works, according to analysis of families with children born in 2000. In a project funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, a team from the department of epidemiology and public health at University College London found no evidence of detrimental effects on the young children of mothers working part-time or full-time.

Another day, another study on whether women who work are jeopardizing their children’s well-being. According to a review of 50 years of research on the subject, kids whose moms went back to work before the kids were 3 years old had no worse academic or behavioral problems than kids whose moms stayed home. In fact, in some instances they did better.

Would you please give my hypothetical wife a better hypothetical position. I will never marry a lawyer.

You can have any upwardly-mobile, career-oriented feminist you like, Leon. H.R. representative? Suffering-studies professor? Something in advertising?

Leon wrote:

Also, as someone who works, and does all the housework, as I currently live alone, you must be doing it wrong if you really believe its such an imposing burden that one spouse needs to do it full time.

I might have fallen for this one before getting married and having children, but I have learned that the amount of housework a single man requires to keep his affairs in order is trivial compared to that of an entire family. The two are simply not comparable, especially while the children are still young.

You keep saying feminist, but the vast majority of households have two workers, lets not get confused about who is taking the more extreme position here. Are all women who work, and men who marry them, feminists? Are you that out of touch. I might have fallen for your chore bit, but growing up both my parents worked, did equal share of chores, and I did them as well. Again if you think they are such a burden you must be doing something wrong. Another poster posted a study, and you dismissed it out of hand. So far all you have given is outdated stereotypes and anctedotes about what a massive burden chores are. Either post relavent studies and facts or stop acting like you know what's best for another group of people.

In short, "Our clan shaman said it was okay to park my infant in a daycare while my wife-for-the-next-five-years-until-she-divorces-me climbs the career ladder."

Lot's of stay at home moms divorce their husbands too.

True. There are plenty of things which can undermine a marriage, especially given how socially-sanctioned tearing apart a family over vague intangibles has become. When "something's missing" becomes an acceptable reason to rend a family assunder, society has fully given up its role in preserving families, and only personal virtue can avail one.

...and facts or stop acting like you know what's best for another group of people.

I am not advising you -- or anyone -- to change your ways. I simply enjoin you to watch as the logical consequences of your cultural values play out in the modern world. You want me to give you data? Wait and see.

...and facts or stop acting like you know what's best for another group of people.

I am not advising you -- or anyone -- to change your ways. I simply enjoin you to watch as the logical consequences of your cultural values play out in the modern world. You want me to give you data? Wait and see.

Firstly, who said anything about psychologists? Surely sociologists would be the ones to defer to on this issue. As to your second point, hasn't dual earners been the norm since around the 60's or 70's? There's at least 40 relavent years, wait and see? Where are those societal problems you warned of? I do agree that women, and men, are overworked, and that a shorter work week would fix the problems you describe without relegating one sex to housework and parenting.

As to your second point, hasn't dual earners been the norm since around the 60's or 70's? There's at least 40 relavent years, wait and see? Where are those societal problems you warned of?

Alright, so this tells me you are happy with the status quo regarding this matter, and are happy to see further trends in that direction. The things I consider obvious and growing problems, you see no problem with -- or even seem pleased by -- such that you are perplexed as to what could cause my concern! We'll see if you remain so pleased as things progress further along these lines. As I said, the world makes my case for me here, so I've not much more to say. If you like what you see, then you go ahead and run with it. I'm sure you know what's best for yourself, right?

As to your second point, hasn't dual earners been the norm since around the 60's or 70's? There's at least 40 relavent years, wait and see? Where are those societal problems you warned of?

Alright, so this tells me you are happy with the status quo regarding this matter, and are happy to see further trends in that direction. The things I consider obvious and growing problems, you see no problem with -- or even seem pleased by -- such that you are perplexed as to what could cause my concern! We'll see if you remain so pleased as things progress further along these lines. As I said, the world makes my case for me here, so I've not much more to say. If you like what you see, then you go ahead and run with it. I'm sure you know what's best for yourself, right?

What are talking about? I'm not happy that a one income family isn't financially viable anymore, but that's an economics issue rather than a social one. Unless you think women being able to work is the cause of wage stagnation, seriously what are you going on about. I think greater freedom for women, and men, to choose what to do is great. Do I think two people having to work to barely make a living is good, no, but that's due to mechanization and off shoring. Even if what you say is true, what would you do about it. At this point you are like an old man shaking his fist and talking about how things used to be.

Back on topic, the women in good jobs in china without men aren't the real danger, it's all those men without jobs and wives that have the potential to tear a country apart. It's not the women attacking Japanese in the streets.

Unless you think women being able to work is the cause of wage stagnation

Gee how could a massively-increased labor supply have an impact on its capitalistic value?

Leon wrote:

I think greater freedom for women, and men, to choose what to do is great.

I can be (and am) happy at the dignity freedom affords to men and women without being happy at how it is utilized. Talk of freedom is a red herring here.

Leon wrote:

Even if what you say is true, what would you do about it.

Too complex to go into when you do not even think there is a problem to be solved.

Leon wrote:

At this point you are like an old man shaking his fist and talking about how things used to be.

I think otherwise, but I can see why you'd say so.

Leon wrote:

Back on topic, the women in good jobs in china without men aren't the real danger, it's all those men without jobs and wives that have the potential to tear a country apart. It's not the women attacking Japanese in the streets.

You are correct that an abundance of men consigned to life-long bachelorhood is a problem, and while certain Chinese policies are in no small part responsible for this, one would imagine that many women failing to marry would also be an exacerbating influence on that problem. But I guess not!

Unless you think women being able to work is the cause of wage stagnation

Gee how could a massively-increased labor supply have an impact on its capitalistic value?

Leon wrote:

I think greater freedom for women, and men, to choose what to do is great.

I can be (and am) happy at the dignity freedom affords to men and women without being happy at how it is utilized. Talk of freedom is a red herring here.

Leon wrote:

Even if what you say is true, what would you do about it.

Too complex to go into when you do not even think there is a problem to be solved.

Leon wrote:

At this point you are like an old man shaking his fist and talking about how things used to be.

I think otherwise, but I can see why you'd say so.

Leon wrote:

Back on topic, the women in good jobs in china without men aren't the real danger, it's all those men without jobs and wives that have the potential to tear a country apart. It's not the women attacking Japanese in the streets.

You are correct that an abundance of men consigned to life-long bachelorhood is a problem, and while certain Chinese policies are in no small part responsible for this, one would imagine that many women failing to marry would also be an exacerbating influence on that problem. But I guess not!

I'll agree to disagree with most of this. Although, wasn't the increase of two income families a response to wage stagnation and increased costs of living, which caused women to work, rather than being caused by women working. Solid blue collar jobs being lost aren't because of women working, but of globalization and mechanization. Perhaps to an extent having an increased pool of potential workers drive wages down, but if this is even the case it would pale in comparison to other factors.

As to china, again, why would educated women marry peasants? The real problem is not some women not marrying, which is a small subset of the female population, but rather that there are simply more men than women.
The social issues, in china, are barely worth mentioning in comparison to the demographic issues.

A good question. It, the (quite valid) assumptions which underlie it illustrate, and the entailments of those assumptions illustrate with crystalline clarity the defect in the culture you champion. Not much more to say. Good evening.